Do you respect P4P women?

[Guest]

>>>I posted before saying that it seems like an easy way out to send daughters into prostitution and got jumped on soundly.<<<

 

 

people in general do not like to have their little illusions dented a bit.

 

 

 

 

>>>It is the concept of "easy way" out for most pf these women, can come from them or the parents, I do blame on parents more than the women though. <<<

 

 

i mainly blame the political leaders of the last 5 decades - the only example they have given their people was how to jump on get rich quick scemes, and how to be corrupt.

when the fish is rotten is starts stinking at the head.

[cardinalblue]

Jasmine,

 

I agree somewhat with "the easy way out" answer except this would be the view from the outside world and not the insiders meaning the girls and their sub-culture. They are nothing but ignorant pawns in this equation and they are following what they have been told to do and what they see themselves.

 

Who says we are not products of our own environment? I do follow and support the 80/20 rule of narture/nature formula.

 

Poverty is a symptom not the cause of their predicament. There is a combination of causal factors working together that drives/choices these boys and girls to end up in whatever they do be it prostitution or the flip side kids becoming successful professionals. We don't have look at LOS; we can look at our own lives and it follows the same patterns as it does the world over. Sure, the degrees and there will be exceptions and cultural/custom variations but this of course is expected and predicted.

 

While there will not be a 100% linear correlation between these causal factors and outcome, there will be incredible strong correlation especially at the two extremes rich and poor.

 

That is why we always hear about the exceptions, a poor kid breaking their predestined ceiling or a rich child from a wealthy/good family being a rotten apple/failure in life.

 

People are always surprise but really it is no surprise at all.If you dig deep enough, each case can be explained by causal factors whether be genetic or environmetal (family, traditional pressures, education, cultural, peers, school, role-models, activities, etc).

 

Personally, I see very little difference between why many issan boys and girls end up in prostitution and why the off-spring of coal miners in PA or west virgina end up being coal miners. Sure, different professions but the same causal factors are in play...

 

Enough of this talk about poverty/money needs drives them to do what they do. This argument does not and cannot explain why 75% of them or whatever the high figure is, do not end up in prostitution.....

 

Cardinalblue

[Fiery Jack]

Lusty said:

I know people who will only choose as friends people who are only richer than themselves...

 

That's interesting. Since my "messy" divorce, I have found myself adhering to this very policy actually, though not through choice.

 

jack

[pattaya127]

It is the concept of "easy way" out for most pf these women

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I understand that, but i think you and flyW (here i am surprised because he has a good grasp of the P4P structiure and its industrialization in the thai context) only talk about it as if it was the women, or their family who decided to have a sex industry out of "easy way-ness". On the face of it, they never made that decision.

 

the question is not just about the easiness of choosing, or of sending girls, to work in the industry, but the easiness of having such an industry to "welcome" them.

 

Of course, 40 years on (talking of tourist P4P), it seems like evryone is making an individual choice, and may very well do, but the whole equation of the well-oiled structure, which had ramifications into not just the underworld, but a huge segment of the powers to be, conspiring to make money and attract tourism thru pimping thai women, is truly what had it snowballing as a fact of society, not the greed of families first.

 

FlyW knows very well how powerless, and sometimes clueless villagers could be when dealing with outsiders and middle-men. indebtment and spoliation of land following the govnmt's disastrous pushing of cash crop, swindling by unscrupulous businessmen , and the middle-men coming in, offering cash for flesh, are the sides of the same coin of powerlessnes against more powerful people, who could make the law side with them.

 

That behaviour came because of the industry and its tentacular reach into the Provinces and shanty towns. It is not to excuse anyone to send their daughter, but we can't understand the huge P4P incidence if we ignore the collusion of powerful forces to sell flesh as the basis for it.

 

So today, it's free for all, not denying it, but Jasmine, i have a question for you and what you think thais could answer, besides you: why did thailand (and unfortunatley, thai women) come to have this reputation of brothel of the world? would you blame it solely on the village families greed? That is some power of decision I have never seen them have in the past....

[Guest]

>>>FlyW knows very well how powerless, and sometimes clueless villagers could be when dealing with outsiders and middle-men. indebtment and spoliation of land following the govnmt's disastrous pushing of cash crop, swindling by unscrupulous businessmen , and the middle-men coming in, offering cash for flesh, are the sides of the same coin of powerlessnes against more powerful people, who could make the law side with them.<<<

 

 

yes, and it still needs a family and her daughters to say yes and go along with the middlemen. it's not really a secret what sort of businesses those middlemen do supply.

see the case of the missus, two main reasons she did not end up in the trade was because of her very strong family (the vast majority of her female cousins ended up in the trade), and her being incredibly headstrong. when the middlemen came to the family when the missus was 15 the mother kicked them out with a broom, the father let out a couple of deaththreads in case of an eventual return (which in his case, veteran of many brutal battles, were to be taken serious).

 

but unfortunately it has become tradition in many families that the female members do go off to the business. and that is often regardless of the money they have already earned. you can see from the example of 'ban jan' (and several other similar villages but not as famous), that earnings from protitution do rarely lead into education, but further industrialisation of prostitution.

it is just the easy way out.

the leaders of the country of the last decades do not give them any good example either, given their conduct. they traditionally also appear to take the easy road, the road of bubble economies and furtherment through corruption.

what you have in thailand is not the effects of dire poverty, but the effects of a society rotten to the core. the massive prostitution is but one of the visible effects.

and my personal prediction over the next decade is that it is gonna get a lot worse before it might get better again.

[jasmine]

[color:"red"] Poverty is a symptom not the cause of their predicament. There is a combination of causal factors working together that drives/choices these boys and girls to end up in whatever they do be it prostitution or the flip side kids becoming successful professionals. We don't have look at LOS; we can look at our own lives and it follows the same patterns as it does the world over. Sure, the degrees and there will be exceptions and cultural/custom variations but this of course is expected and predicted.

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I do appreciate your well-thought response CB. It is true that we look at things based on our experience. I feel that I grew up in such environment that parents celebrated when the babies were girls for there wouldd be another "girl" to the market. My father was heavily involved with teachers educating these families, not that he was an ideal man, it was just that he happened to love the females and wanted to protect them.

 

I have met many tachers, including the young ones who are teaching in villages in Isaan and the Nortern parts of Thailand who struggle to convince these parents NOT to send their children out for prostitution but raely successful. A few teachers got into trobles with certain parents for "interferring", it is discouraging

 

I feel that the parents who really want their children NOT to go into prostitution can do it, with lots of struggles of course.

 

I met a Thai man (last year who told me his story)from the North whose father died and the mother was not in good health and the rice crop did not cover raising his twin younger sisters. He left home (a village in Lampang) at 16 for BKK to join his village friend who was a male prostitute. He could not be the male pros., so he worked in a restuarant with very unkind owner who beaten him up. With the help of another worker (an illegal Burmese), he found another job as a waiter in a bar. The owner of this one actually helped him to go to off-campus school with him working as many hours as possible(it warmed my heart to hear such kindness). Meanwhile his twin sister became 15 and the neighbors were pushing hard to get the mother to send them to prostitution, including his relatives. His mother and him have decided that a long time ago that it would not happen and his late father have said that also.

 

Of course, there were help from a couple of teachers to keep the girls in school. The young man is 19 and in Thammasart. I met him because a friend at TM told me about him searching for a grant and the Univ., had no grants left. This kid is struggling because he does try to send some money to his family for his mother is ill and cannot work. He works in anything he can. I have NEVER met any one in my life who can appreciate the 10,000 Baht money such as him.

 

I don't believe in just giving money away for it becomes a habit of many Thais who knows only how to spend but giving to someone who knwos the value does warm my soul.

 

My Thai family struggled when my father got killed and none of the relatives wanted to be around us because most of them do NOT want ask to ask for help (not that we would ask), there was only a couple who was my father's distant cousin who offerred a break. The money has been a big issue in Thailand for genrations and I am not proud of it.

 

[color:"red"]Enough of this talk about poverty/money needs drives them to do what they do. This argument does not and cannot explain why 75% of them or whatever the high figure is, do not end up in prostitution.....

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IMO, it is the morale, as a Thai female, an Isaan Thai, very poor background, never a prostitute, once told me "I'd rather clean toilets than laying there spreading my legs for any man". She has been here in the States, came in as a servant of a Thai family, has been married to a modest-income American but seem to be a good man, now. She works in a hotel as a maid, her husband works on a second job as a janitor and thery are sending their 2 children to college at this time.

 

I maintain that it is a choice we do make which is a background for the futures. I have many tales to say about many Thais who came from a modest/poor background who never enter prostitution who are well off today.

 

Jasmine

[jasmine]

[color:"red"] (the vast majority of her female cousins ended up in the trade), and her being incredibly headstrong. when the middlemen came to the family when the missus was 15 the mother kicked them out with a broom, the father let out a couple of deaththreads in case of an eventual return (which in his case, veteran of many brutal battles, were to be taken serious).

 

[/color]

 

This is what I meant that the parents must be the ones to say "no". My father would have killed if anyone suggested such act about his daughter (sure, you can imagine what I would have said). My mother did not keep her moth shut either when there was such suggestion when my father got killed.

 

It is the parents, I don't buy that the parents are ignorant, more like they set the priority on fast money.

 

[color:"red"] the leaders of the country of the last decades do not give them any good example either, given their conduct. they traditionally also appear to take the easy road, the road of bubble economies and furtherment through corruption.

what you have in thailand is not the effects of dire poverty, but the effects of a society rotten to the core. the massive prostitution is but one of the visible effects.

[/color]

 

I don't argue about that, however, ones do NOT have to follow bad examples, do they?

 

Many stories I have heard on getting into prostitution in the case of emergencies and I cannot argue about that either. Met a few women who did it for a short time and left the industry for good.

 

Having said that, I also have met a few women who are married (mostly to European/Scandinavian men) who go back to Thailand regularly to perform their old profession just for fun ::

 

Jasmine

[jasmine]

[color:"red"] know people who will only choose as friends people who are only richer than themselves.Very shallow IMO.

 

[/color]

 

I also met many Thais who make friends with "poorer" people to make themselves feel "superior".

 

Jasmine

[JJsushi]

jasmine said:

 

I maintain that it is a choice we do make which is a background for the futures. I have many tales to say about many Thais who came from a modest/poor background who never enter prostitution who are well off today.

 

Jasmine

 

Niice and all to wax eloquent about the poor Thais that avoid a life of prostitution and the "easy way out". Nice to hear the simple argument that the MAJORITY of poor Thais do not enter into the P4P scene.

 

I have yet to hear as to why an abnormally large number of poor Thai children enter into the P4P business. I posted my guess-estimate a while ago on the number of prostitution aged women I believe in P4P That number is atrocious and it very well signifies that P4P is an industry. Notice how high the concentration of prostitutes come from poor backgrounds. That belies more than it is simply "the easy way out" as some like to continue to argue. I would say that it is "a way out" from a life that offers too few other options.

 

Lets look at the numbers or estimates.

 

Age structure:

0-14 years: 24% (male 7,386,231; female 7,107,010)

15-64 years: 70% (male 21,102,363; female 21,714,411)

65 years and over: 6% (male 1,726,043; female 2,194,816) (2000 est.)

 

This core population includes the

central Thai (33.7% of the population, including Bangkok),

Northeastern Thai (34.2%),

northern Thai (18.8%), and southern Thai (13.3%).

 

 

the female population of ages 15-64 is roughly 22m lets for arguments sake say that 30% of that age group would fit into the definition of "suitable prostitution age". That leaves us with a female population of 6m women. Now estimates of the number of prostitutes range from 200k to 1m. Let;s say the real number is 500k. That means that 8% of women are prostitutes within that group. That is a very high number, not insignificant in the least bit. 8% of your eligible young women turn to a life of prostitution.

 

Let's extrapolate it further with Northeastern Thais which make up 34% of total population. Assuming their weighting is the same in our subpopulation of suitable aged woomen they would constitute roughly 2m of that group. Now there are studies that show that they make up 70% of prostitutes. So out of that 500k total prostitutes, they represent roughly 350k So roughly 18% of their eligible young women are prostitutes. Basically 1 out of 5 and that is a conservative estimate. That is not a choice that is an industry.

 

Keep in mind we are only talking actual prostitutes, we are not even calculating the support staff for the industry, such as dek serves, recruiters, etc.

 

Imagine if 8% of eligible women in the US or Western Europe were prostitutes that would be cause for a freaking national alarm. Most of the men may be happy though.

 

Easy way out? I think not. A small number of women entering into prostitution? That is laughable. An institution that is a full blown industry? Damn right. An industry that utilizes poor uneducated women to supply it? Double damn right.

 

People need to start examining why so MANY young Thai women ENTER into prostitution, not why so many don't enter into P4P.

[JJsushi]

cardinalblue said:

 

Enough of this talk about poverty/money needs drives them to do what they do. This argument does not and cannot explain why 75% of them or whatever the high figure is, do not end up in prostitution.....

 

Cardinalblue

 

You explain it then.

 

This is where your argument falls flat and it is half baked. Read my previous post which has some estimates.. Since you like to speak of statistics and correlations. Show me where the same percentage of millionaire families from the Northeast of Thailand have 8% or 1 out of every 5 of their daughters engaged in P4P. Better yet show me the same natioanal percentages of your wealthy vs poverty subset that have their daughters engaged in P4P.

 

Now when you can prove that; take those percentages and correlate them to the US or Europe. Do we have 8% of our eligible women involved in P4P? Why not?

 

To say that economics does not drive women into making a choice to enter P4P is completely ludicrous on your part. Do these women fuck for free? Do they have a better opportunity to make more money cleaning hotel rooms? Do we need to draw a supply and demand schedule to analyze the theories? It is economics CB don't kid yourself.